News & Alerts

Women in Science Grant Challenges Status Quo Animal Research

BOSTON, MA, Sept. 5, 2013—The New England Anti-Vivisection Society (NEAVS), Boston, and its affiliate, the American Fund for Alternatives to Animal Research (AFAAR), New York, continue their legacy of supporting scientists committed to non-animal research with the launch of their Fellowship Grant for Alternatives to Animal Research in Women’s Health and Sex Differences.

The $40,000 postdoctoral annual award will go to a woman working to develop, use, or validate non-animal alternatives to advance women’s health and/or understanding of sex-based differences in research results. Funding begins in 2014.

NEAVS and AFAAR work to advance scientific methods that are more efficient, efficacious, and predictive of human responses than outdated and cruel animal experiments and testing. Millions of animals suffer in scientific, biomedical, industrial, military, cosmetic, and other areas of research. In many cases results, when extrapolated to humans, are limited, erroneous, dangerous, or even deadly. Advances in science and technology make animal suffering unnecessary and replace the flawed use of animals for the purported benefit of human health with better science. (See the latest developments in alternatives.)

“Our new Fellowship Grant’s pioneering approach of focusing on women, women’s health, and sex differences promises important contributions to medical breakthroughs. The grant supports a new generation of compassionate researchers dedicated to science that will better lead to the results humans need and are waiting for, and an end to the archaic reliance on research on animals,” said NEAVS President Theodora Capaldo, EdD.

NEAVS investigations show that research results from studies on men often do not apply to women.* For example, because men and women do not metabolize drugs in the same manner, factors like dosage and side effects can differ greatly. Such differing drug reactions are not trivial, and can be life threatening. For the cardiac drug d-Sotalol, the risk of death in women was 2.5 times greater than in men. Similarly, scientific evidence shows results from research on animals most often does not translate to humans. According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), nine out of ten drugs that work in animals fail in humans. Documenting the impact of differences in research results even between men and women further challenges the use of other species to benefit humans.

Studies show women are more likely to oppose the harmful use of animals in research, testing, and education than men. As such, animal use can discourage or divert women from science careers. In NIH’s 2007 Intramural Research Program, women made up only 29% of tenure-track investigators and held just 19% of tenured senior investigator appointments. Women scientists are funded less and have lower salaries. And, according to 2010 National Science Foundation figures, women only comprised about 23% of full-time doctoral level science professors.

“The inequality between men and women in science contributes to status quo research that clings to using animals despite the unquestionable evidence against it,” said Dr. Capaldo. “The 2014-15 Fellowship Grant for Alternatives to Animal Research in Women’s Health and Sex Differences takes aim at this inequality by supporting budding women researchers, and pushes superior, modern science forward.”

The application deadline is Dec. 15, 2013. Award notification will be sent on or before Jan. 15, 2014. Visit the AFAAR website for more details.

Founded in 1895, the New England Anti-Vivisection Society (NEAVS) is a Boston-based, national animal advocacy organization dedicated to ending the use of animals in research, testing, and science education. Through research, outreach, education, legislation, litigation, and policy change, NEAVS advocates for replacing animals with modern alternatives that are ethically, humanely, and scientifically superior.